The Effect of Emotional Intelligence on Marital Harmony and Marital Discard with Perception of Equity as Mediator

Emotional Intelligence is the most recent development in understanding the relationship between thought and emotion that effectively makes a person compatible with needs، pressures and challenges of life. Marital harmony and discard is considered as one the most important and yet the most challenging issue in the field of counseling science. Investigations have shown that one of the related factors in marital relationship is perception of equity in marital relationship. This study aimed to investigate the direct and indirect effects of emotional intelligence on marital harmony and discard with mediation of perception of equity. The subjects of the study were 150 couples (150 men، 150 women) whose children were studying at elementary schools of Shiraz، selected by multiphase random sampling in 2013. Assessment instruments contained Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire Self-Report (EQS)، Marital Harmony Questionnaire (MHQ)، and Marital Discard Questionnaire (MDQ)، and Measure of Equity Perceived (MEP). Data were analyzed by structural equation modeling (SEM) and also the indirect effects were tested by bootstrapping method. The results indicated that the proposed model did have good fit indices. The results also showed that the emotional intelligence affects both directly and indirectly on marital harmony and marital discard and perception of equity is known as the most important factor in healthy relationships.